KARMAL, BABRAK equivalents. Alliances changed fast and furiously while all sides took turns battling with each other. That April President Suleiman Franjieh appointed Karami prime minister one more time, counting on his stature within the Muslim community to encourage peaceful relations. But even he could not stop the fighting at this juncture, and in December 1976 President ELIAS SARKIS replaced him with Salim Hoss. The militancy of Muslim factions increased after the April 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. The following year President AMIN GEMAYEL signed a treaty with Israel to formalize Israel’s occupation of the southern half of the country. Karami then became an outspoken opponent of Gemayel, and the following May he established the National Salvation Front to resist further Israeli encroachment. In 1984 he attended two national reconciliation conferences in Geneva and Lausanne, Switzerland, but accord proved elusive. Fighting continued unabated until 1985, when Karami helped broker the Tripartite Agreement among rival armed militias and religious groups. In May 1987 the Lebanese legislature revoked the 1983 treaty with Israel, along with the 1969 Cairo Accord. This legislation, which Gemayel touted as the “National Agreement to Solve the Lebanese Crisis,” was crafted with minimal Sunni cooperation, and Karami, as prime minister, refused to sign it. Karami’s intransigence toward Gemayel only further strained relations between the Christian and Muslim communities, and in May 1987 Karami tendered his resignation. It was refused by Gemayel, for no Sunni politician of his stature could be found to replace him. Unfortunately, on June 1, 1987, the prime minister died when the helicopter he was riding in exploded. Since then, Samir Geagea of the Lebanese Forces Militia has been implicated in his murder. But Karami’s 10 terms as Lebanon’s prime minister is a record and establishes him as one of the nation’s most enduring political figures. Further Reading Attie, Caroline. Lebanon in the 1950s. London: I. B. Tauris, 2002. Dagher, Carole. Bring Down the Walls: Lebanon’s Postwar Challenge. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000. Najem, Tom. Lebanon: The Politics of a Penetrated Society. London: Routledge, 2002. Picard, Elizabeth. Lebanon, a Shattered Country: Myths and Realities of the Wars in Lebanon. New York: Holes and Meier, 2002.
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Salem, Elie A. Violence and Diplomacy in Lebanon: The Troubled Years, 1982–1988. New York: I. B. Tauris, 1995. Schultz, Kirsten F. Israel’s Covert Diplomacy in Lebanon. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998.
Karmal, Babrak (1929–1996) president of Afghanistan Babrak Karmal was born in Kamari, Afghanistan, on January 6, 1929, the son of a leading army general. He was related by birth to future prime minister Mohammed Daoud and the reigning king, Mohammad Zahir Shah. Karmal was educated at German-language schools before gaining admittance to the University of Kabul in 1949. There he embraced Marxism and was subsequently arrested and jailed for political activity. His cellmate was Mir Akbar Khyber, a leading Marxist theorist, who refined his understanding of revolutionary politics. Released in 1956, Karmal continued his studies at the university before gaining employment with the ministry of education. By 1961 he had transferred to the ministry of planning where he was working when Prime Minister Daoud reduced Zahir Shah to a constitutional monarch in 1964. Karmal then left the government to concentrate on politics. The following year he helped found the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), which immediately split into two factions. The largest, the Khalg (the Masses), under Nur Mohammed Taraki was Maoist-oriented, while the Parcham (the Banner) under Karmal retained a Soviet orientation. The factions maintained a tenuous truce, and in July 1973 they assisted Daoud in deposing the king and declaring a republic. However, on April 28, 1978, Marxists in the military killed Daoud and established the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. Taraki, the new president, then purged the party of Parcham adherents. Karmal, serving as ambassador to Czechoslovakia, was ordered home to face trial but fled to Moscow. Taraki was then killed by his chief adviser, Hafizullah Amin, an act that convinced Soviet premier LEONID BREZHNEV to intervene directly with force. On December 25, 1979, thousands of Soviet troops spilled over the border and Amin was killed. Two days later Karmal arrived in Kabul on a Soviet transport and was installed as the new president of Afghanistan. He also assumed the portfolios of prime minister, party